|1| Why dost thou heap up
Wealth, which thou must quit,Or, what is worse, be left by it?Why
dost thou load thyself, when thou'rt to fly,Oh Man ordained to
die?|2| Why dost thou build up
stately Rooms on high,Thou who art under Ground to lie?Thou Sow'st
and Plantest, but no Fruit must see;For Death, alas! is sowing
Thee.|3| Suppose, thou Fortune could
to tameness bring,And clip or pinion her wing;Suppose thou couldst
on Fate so far prevailAs not to cut off thy
Entail.|4| Yet Death at all that
subtilty will laugh,Death will that foolish Gardner mockWho does a
slight and annual Plant engraff,Upon a lasting
stock.|5| Thou dost thyself Wise and
Industrious deem;A mighty Husband thou wouldst seem;Fond Man! like
a bought slave, thou all the whileDost but for others Sweat and
Toil.|6| Officious Fool! that needs
must medling beIn business that concerns not thee!For when to
Future years thou'extendst thy caresThou deal'st in other men's
affairs.|7| Even aged men, as if
they truly wereChildren again, for Age prepare,Provisions for long
travail they design,In the last point of their short
Line.|8| Wisely the Ant against poor
Winter hoordsThe stock which Summers wealth affords,In
Grasshoppers that must at Autumn die,How vain were such an
Industry?|9| Of Power and Honour the
deceitful LightMight half excuse our cheated sight,If it of Life
the whole small time would stay,And be our Sun-shine all the
day,|10| Like Lightning that, begot
but in a Cloud(Though shining bright, and speaking loud)Whilst it
begins, concludes its violent Race,And where it Guilds, it wounds the
place.|11| Oh Scene of Fortune,
which dost fair appear,Only to men that stand not near!Proud
Poverty, that Tinsel brav'ry wears,And like a Rainbow, painted
Tears!|12| Be prudent, and the shore
in prospect keep,In a weak Boat trust not the deep.Placed beneath
Envy, above envying rise;Pity Great Men, Great Things
despise.|13| The wise example of the
Heavenly Lark,Thy Fellow-Poet, Cowley mark,Above the Clouds
let thy proud Musique sound,Thy humble Nest build on the
Ground.

Both the Latin and English are based on texts
owned by the editor and comprising these errors, which are duly corrected
above: Latin 23: uti for ut; 34: minimo for minimè.
Ampersands have been silently expanded in both texts, and long "s" and
italicized punctuation have been normalized throughout. Cowley's Latin is
in 10 Sapphic stanzas and 40 lines and his English in 13 stanzas and 52
lines, with English stanzas 3 and 4 corresponding to nothing in the Latin
and English stanzas 5 and 6 constituting a longer equivalent of Latin
stanza 3. The Latin poem was first published posthumously in the
Carminum Miscellaneorum Liber concluding the Poemata Latina
of 1668; the English poem, part of Cowley's English Works, first
appeared that same year in the essay, "The
Shortness of Life and the Uncertainty of Riches."